More Than Words
by ficdirectory
Summary: Who is Rachel Berry without her voice? She and Finn are in a car accident on the way to the train station in 3x22, "Goodbye." Finn walks away unharmed, but Rachel suffers a devastating injury that will change the course of her future, and everything she believes about herself. Fill for a request in the Glee Angst Meme. WARNING: Injury.
1. Chapter 1

Rachel never sees it coming.

One moment, Finn is driving down the road toward their future, and the next everything just changes. Rachel isn't even positive what happens. All she knows is first, they are fine, and then, they are spinning. Finn is doing his best to control the car, but it careens into a nearby fence. The next thing Rachel knows, the windshield shatters. The next thing Rachel knows, she is pinned in her seat.

Finn is somehow unhurt, but frantic, as he calls her name. He reaches for her, and she instinctively keeps him away.

"Don't…touch…it…" she manages. Her voice is audible, but she can only manage one word at a time. Each one is spoken in a careful, breathy staccato.

"Oh, my God…I'm gonna be sick… Rachel, I'm so sorry. We've gotta get you out of here, okay? Just hold on. I'll call for help, he says and he finds his phone. The voice on the other end is loud enough for Rachel to overhear.

"Allen County 911. Do you have an emergency?"

"Yes!" Finn exclaims. "My girlfriend and I were in an accident!"

"Okay. Where are you, sir?"

"Lima!" Finn says, sounding desperate.

"Okay. Where, in Lima?"

Rachel gasps out the last street names she can recall before everything started spinning. She whispers the obvious landmarks around them, and Finn can't hear her through his panic. He's telling the operator they are by a fence, and some trees.

Slowly, it dawns on Rachel. They're not just _by _a fence. This is bad. It's bad, but she needs to stay calm, because _someone_ needs to stay calm right now. Since she can't rely on Finn, Rachel has to rely on herself. She tries to imagine herself as just an actress playing a part, like Blaine's brother suggested, but this is not the same at all. This is very real.

It takes forever for help to arrive, and when it does, the sirens make Rachel even more anxious. It occurs to her for the first time that she will have to be moved. She doesn't feel pain. She feels urgency. Rachel needs to establish a perimeter around herself. She needs to protect herself. Finn is already out. And people are around her. Talking to her. Encroaching on her. She does her best, keeping them back with a hand, and with firm glances.

"Okay, Rachel?" one rescue worker says, and she thinks absently that Finn must have told him her name.

"Yes," she murmurs. Her voice is so soft it might only be a sigh. Fear, she hopes, not damage.

"I'm here to help you. We're going to get you out of here. Can you breathe all right?" he asks, just a disembodied voice to her right.

"Yes…but…it's…hard…to…speak…" she murmurs. It's agonizingly slow.

"I understand. Yes or no questions from now on," he promises. "Does anything else hurt?" he asks, and she can imagine him trying to survey her in the mess twisted metal, glass and wood.

"Hip," she winces, because my God, it does.

If he says anything, his words are lost on Rachel. This nameless rescue worker who's job it is to save her when she is so thoroughly unsavable.

While they work, it is this man's job simply to keep her distracted. To keep her conscious. To be certain she has an airway. So many responsibilities. So many things he could say, and yet he chooses, "Is that your boyfriend over there? Were you going on a date?" she hears a gentle smile in his voice as he monitors her vitals.

"Married…" she corrects.

"Ah, well congratulations. We're gonna have you out of here in no time."

It isn't no time. It's nearly an hour before Rachel is lifted free from the car - the piece of wooden fence protruding from her neck immobilized as best as possible with obscene amounts of cloth, gauze and tape. When they lay her on the stretcher, her eyes go wide. There is fear in her heart that cannot make it's way out of her mouth.

She's in an ambulance and Finn is absolutely horrified.

Vaguely, Rachel is aware of sharp at the back of her right hand. In moments, her eyes are falling closed.

Her last conscious thought is not profound or elusive. It's not one last I love you to Finn or a message for her dads. It's not terrifying or painful. It's simply:

_Wait…_

Then, she drifts into a paralyzing blackness.

* * *

In the blink of an eye, or so it seems, Rachel feels consciousness pulling at her again. She is somewhere else this time. Not the side of the road with a fence through the windshield, or an ambulance, but a hospital room. Her dads are here, holding hands. Watching her.

Rachel opens her eyes and they feel heavy. She hurts in places she cannot remember hurting in the accident. Belatedly, Rachel realizes who is not here.

Finn.

Right now, she doesn't have the energy to worry. She tries to call out but nothing comes. There is fire in her throat and in her leg. It takes all her strength to stare down her fathers. To get them to notice her.

By the time they do, Rachel's eyes are falling closed again. Distantly, she hears them.

"Don't try to talk."

"It's okay. We're here."

_And where_, she thinks remotely, _am I_?

* * *

Time melts. People visit and don't visit. Finn is scarce, where Quinn is an unexpected source of comfort. She stays close and keeps Rachel supplied with paper, pens, a whiteboard, markers, and even her phone, to text, when Quinn thinks no nurses are looking.

It takes concentration and patience but Rachel realizes she will likely have to get used to these forms of communication. The piece of fence that impaled her, amazingly, did not damage her carotid artery. It did, however, do catastrophic damage to her voice. It's too soon to tell how severe it is. Judging by the looks on the doctor's faces it's like Rachel thought on the side of the road.

It's bad.

* * *

Finn breaks up with her and Rachel isn't surprised. She is shocked.

His voice sounds so normal. So strong. So smooth. Rachel is _so _jealous. When he admits that, in fact, he wasn't on the way to the courthouse to be married, but to the train station, she is livid.

Rachel glares at him. _Why?_ she mouths but doesn't voice.

"I was setting you free!" he protests, his voice climbing higher, and each note of desperation makes her ache for those she has lost. "I couldn't let you hold yourself back for me! So I was gonna break up with you and tell you that I'm…that I'm joining the army."

She narrows her eyes and writes with her favorite red whiteboard marker in defiant all capital letters:

_WHAT'S YOUR EXCUSE NOW?_

"What? What do you mean?" Finn wonders like she is hurting him and not the other way around.

_I'M NOT HOLDING YOU BACK ANYMORE, AM I? SO WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?_

"Rachel, I… You know what? Fine. Make me say it."

(She wants to slap him. If only someone, somewhere could make _her _say something_. Anything._)

"This is just too intense for me. Every time I see you, I see that _thing _sticking out of your neck. I _see you_ not letting me help. Not letting me _near you_. God, Rachel. Do you have any idea how that made me feel?"

She has no words. Spoken or written for the incredible insensitivity Finn is showing. So, she does what Cooper would suggest. She points to the door, raises an eyebrow, and waits.

When Finn leaves, she is a wreck.

A wreck no one can hear.

* * *

She has hope for a while. That this thing with her voice is only temporary.

But that hope makes the next blow, when it comes, that much more cruel. She has started talking again, and her speaking voice - which she assumed would be left intact - is far from it. She is left with a high-pitched, soft, hoarse whisper.

There is talk of specialists. Of speech therapy. But when Rachel presses, asking in a hurried scrawl how much recovery she can expect no one will meet her eyes.

"I want to go home," she rasps, and she does not say what she is thinking. If her speaking voice is this destroyed, then singing is out of the question.

* * *

Denial is a powerful thing. For weeks, she rests at home, watching soap operas and whiling her life away. She sleeps more than she should and wakes, each morning, hoping that the afternoon of May twenty-second was a dream, and everything is, in fact, the way it's supposed to be.

Each morning, her wildest hopes are dashed, when she tries to call for her dad or her daddy and cannot project enough to be heard. Not unless they are right beside her.

Put her in a crowded room, a bustling hallway or a New York street, and this Rachel will have no chance. She won't make it.

So, she sleeps. For hours. For days. She lashes out when her parents come to close or insist she get ready to go to physical therapy on her leg, which she hates. And for her voice, which she hates even more deeply. She thought they'd discussed this, she insists, in her new voice that breaks and squeaks whenever she tries to project.

It is the very thing therapists are trying to correct, and God, it's embarrassing.

In the end, she goes. For the leg, it's physically painful and for the voice, it just feels futile. It's taken a while, but reality has finally set in.

She is no longer Rachel Berry, future star, defined by her voice. She is just Rachel, an ordinary girl, searching for a way to be heard.

God, it hurts to be so common, and so uncommon all at once.

* * *

The phone call to NYADA is a special form of torture. Texting in this circumstance would be unprofessional. She has to call. Call, or withdraw in person, which she cannot do. Her leg is still healing. Her fractured femur held together with a plate and screws is a more pressing cause of anguish than the fact that she cannot sing. More intensely physically painful than her lack of a voice. Her leg is taking ridiculously long to heal. Rehabilitation is hell. Needless to say, she is not ready to make the trip to New York to disappoint Madame Tibideaux for the second time in two months. Still, she has to be smart about this. She has to think about someone other than herself.

She has to think of Kurt - who visited almost as frequently as Quinn - bearing the latest celebrity gossip from E! or British tabloid rumor. He had been a blessed bit of normalcy when her life felt anything but. She has to think of Kurt, who she knows, is next in line behind her on NYADA's waiting list.

Rachel takes a deep breath, and dials. She listens to the familiar voice mail message and waits for the beep. She is not expecting her dad to take the phone from her hand and nod at her. Because she has nothing else to lose, she passes her own message along through him. His voice is as heavy with regret as her own would have been, if it wouldn't buckle under the pressure.

"Madame Tibideaux. Rachel Berry regrets to inform you that she will have to withdraw from your program due to unforeseen circumstances. She was involved in a car accident a few months ago, that resulted in a penetrating neck trauma. This has unfortunately affected Rachel's speaking voice, as well as her singing voice, which is why you're listening to her father - not Rachel herself - leaving you this message. If you have any questions please call or email…."

By the end of the call, they are both crying. Her dad tries to hold her but Rachel pulls away.

She drinks cup after cup of water, but nothing fills her sadness.

_To be continued…_


	2. Chapter 2

Rachel should have seen this coming.

Growing up, she never dreamed of a house with a white picket fence. Rachel's dreams were always bigger. They involved the stage, and lights, and performing. So, she guesses it would make sense that a white picket fence might want to seek its revenge by taking her only gift.

At night, she dreams, but it's not nightmares of the accident that plague her. Instead, she dreams of people she loves being in danger. She dreams of opening her mouth to warn them, and of her new voice being too weak to carry any warning to them. She watches, helpless, each night, as harm comes to her family, and her friends. She jerks awake, and limps across her bedroom.

The room itself has been completely transformed. In a way, she's lucky to have gone through it after she choked at her audition - taking down everything that reminded her of future stardom - and the rest of the things that made her uniquely herself are gone, too. What's left are a precious few items. Her telephone, her laptop, her desk and her bed. Her treadmill has been moved to another part of the house, and she has ordered her dads to get rid of all her trophies. She has turned every picture around.

Now, she sits down gingerly at her desk, and opens her laptop. She does this when she cannot sleep. Now that the accident has taken everything away from her, Rachel loathes her middle name. She used to love Barbra for her powerful voice and her unwillingness to conform to Hollywood's version of beauty. But now, Rachel wonders, who will ever find _her _beautiful with a scar on her neck that resembles a hickey - a scar that no amount of makeup can hide. Instead of Barbra, Rachel searches for everything she can on Julie Andrews, who went through unnecessary throat surgery in the late '90s and lost her beautiful vocal range - all but about five very low notes - it's heartbreaking.

It makes Rachel feel like a terrible human being, but she can't stop herself from thinking it, _At least she still has those five notes_. She cannot bear to read the success stories. Matthew West, a singer who had vocal surgery and recovered. His story is too painful for her to bear. Because, why him? Why not her?

She spends months like this. Hiding away in her room, listening to tragic instrumental ballads because the sound of a human voice doing what she no longer can is simply too much. It's months before her fathers intervene.

Before they not so subtly begin leaving college pamphlets lying around in obvious places. On her bed. On her bathroom sink. Taped to her mirror. On the breakfast table. At first, she fights them. She negotiates her own side.

"Honey, you have to go back," her dad says. His voice is regretful but firm. "The longer you wait, the harder it will be."

"I can't go back, Dad," she whispers, not because she wants to, but because it's all she's physically able to do - even after months of therapy. "How will I cope? How will I answer questions if none of the professors can hear me?"

"Sit in the front row," Daddy insists. "Advocate for yourself the way you always have. _Make_ them listen. _Make_ them hear you."

Tears fill her eyes. A lump blocks her throat. "I need a drink of water. Excuse me," she says, and leaves the room.

* * *

She goes back to McKinley only once. She sees Blaine, Brittany, Artie, Tina, Sugar and Joe. There are other students in glee club. The room seems smaller somehow. Mr. Schuester doesn't look directly at her. Only Blaine is brave enough to approach her. To give her a hug. To take her to a quiet corner and ask how she is. If there is anything he can do.

"How's Kurt?" she asks, because it's polite. Her voice is grating. It grinds in this throaty, raspy way that makes her want to hide. But Blaine doesn't flinch. He just cocks his head.

"Can you say that again?" he asks.

"Kurt," she says, emphasizing the consonants because it's all she can really do.

"Oh, Kurt's great. He's got some final performance he's already rehearsing for. He told me how to get tickets and would love for you to come, if you're up to it."

Rachel swallows once. She forces herself to nod. It would be rude to refuse.

"He loves New York, but tells me every day he wishes you were out there with him. Oh my gosh, that reminds me…" he says, pulling out his phone. "I _have _to show you this. Santana got a role on this telenovela. It's fantastic. My favorite thing to do is to make up lines of dialogue for her character."

Rachel sits at attention and tries to absorb the plot in a show called _La Que No Podia Amar._ It's overly dramatic, even for Rachel's tastes. But Santana is a standout in her own small role. She meets Blaine's eyes and smiles - lets it reach all the way to her eyes - to show him how happy she is that Santana is succeeding.

"How are you?" he asks.

Because she's tired of trying to project, Rachel takes out her phone and texts her response. It feels ridiculous, but she will be able to be more thorough this way. She tells him that her dads are making her apply to more schools. That she's decided on one. That she simultaneously loves and loathes the idea of going somewhere 12 hours away.

"Why?" Blaine asks conversationally.

She pulls her lip between her teeth, before speaking the honest truth. "Because…no one will know me there."

* * *

Spring semester begins in mid-January, so a couple days before, she and her dads make the long drive north to the snowy Minnesota campus. It seems so far away from everything and everyone she knows. She hasn't told anyone but Blaine about her plans, but she figures Kurt must know by now. And that if Kurt knows than Finn must. And so must everyone she once held dear.

Rachel stays in a small brick building - in on-campus dorms - her roommate is coming back the day before classes resume. She is nervous sharing space with someone else. Rachel's been an only child all her life and she doesn't necessarily play well with others. At least, she didn't used to.

She tries to concentrate on helping unpack, but her leg starts bothering her partway through and her dads insist she sit down and rest. They will take care of everything. It takes several hours. There are clothes, books, her computer, towels, food, bedding, and countless other items that need to find a place in this tiny room. When all is said and done, her dads seem reluctant to leave her.

"Now, text us if you need anything. Remember to let your professors know if you need something right away. Don't wait. You don't need to fall behind right away."

"Hiram, don't pressure her. We love you, honey."

"I love you, too," she manages.

When they are gone, she thinks about the ride up. How calm she was, while her dads had been nervous wrecks the entire time. How they checked on her and offered to pull over if Rachel needed it.

Strangely, she hadn't needed it. Rachel knows that Quinn, who's halfway through her first year at Yale, struggled with anxiety attacks after her own car accident. Ironically that, too, was on the way to her and Finn's wedding. Talk about ignoring a bad omen. For a while, Rachel simply lies on her bed and stares up at the ceiling. She wonders how on earth she'll survive so many miles from home.

* * *

Classes begin and it's every bit as difficult as Rachel imagines it. She does everything she's been told. Gets a seat in the front. Seeks out the services office for students with particular needs. But nothing prepares her for the fact that much of her classes are dependent upon participation.

Her roommate isn't home often, and when she is, she's constantly asking Rachel to repeat herself and to not tell their res hall advisor about the alcohol she has stashed in their small fridge. Rachel keeps her word. The secret brings up not-so-fond memories of Alcohol Awareness Week at McKinley which ended abruptly when Brittany vomited all over her, after singing a Ke$ha song at a school assembly. It was purple and vile, thanks to Rachel's own concoction made from various liquors from her dads' collection, plus cough syrup, and crumbled up cookies. Whenever Rachel opens her tiny fridge now, and sees the cans, she feels her skin crawl uncomfortably.

On weekends, her roommate is out late. She parties like no one Rachel has ever seen, and runs down the hall, screaming other girls' names in a drunk and very loud voice at two in the morning. To escape, Rachel pulls a robe around her and goes to the common room. There's a TV and a DVD player. A ping-pong table and a vending machine. And in an adjoining room - there's a piano. Rachel knows how to play, but she never really has before. There had never been a need, with Brad always around at McKinley.

There had never been a need to play, when she could sing.

So Rachel fills her empty nights with music. It's been months, and professors still ask her to speak up. Rachel still sits alone to eat her salad in the dining hall. The only people she attracts are outcasts like herself. Young men in wheelchairs, who make her think of Artie. A tiny, pale girl with short hair, piercings, and a decidedly male way of being. The girl - Amber - latches onto Rachel, and Rachel doesn't mind. She lets Amber talk, and nods in all the right places.

Because everyone deserves to be heard.

Because it's the right thing to do.

At night, when she returns to the dorm, Rachel sneaks into the alcove with the ancient wooden piano and plays songs that haunt the edges of her memory. _Gravity_ by Sara Bareilles. _The Lonely_ by Christina Perri. But Rachel soon discovers that the songs that are supposed to have vocals hurt too much to play and not ache to fill the empty spaces with a voice she does not have. So instead she gravitates toward pieces that are solely piano ballads. _Atlantic_ by Sleeping at Last. _Gabu_ by The Side Project.

And Rachel finds, it hurts a little less.

* * *

She has shut Kurt out because she has to. Because it hurts too much. Because she cannot be the friend he deserves. Instead, Rachel spends the next months focusing on herself. On trying to find the girl behind the voice. Trying to remember what she liked before singing. Before performing. Before basking in the approval of others.

Slowly, she finds herself. Note by note, behind that piano. She starts bringing a pencil and blank paper. She tries her hand at writing music. At lyrics. It seems ridiculous, especially coming from the girl who once penned a song called _My Headband_, and another called _The Only Berry on My Family Tree_. But, she reminds herself, she has also written _Get It Right_, and contributed to _Loser Like Me._

Even those songs, seem juvenile somehow, though. So she plays through chord progressions until something catches.

Until she begins to write the song that has been in her heart for months.

Until she begins to write _White Picket Fences. _The words and the music come quickly. In less than an hour, it's all there. Notes, chords and lyrics. For the first time in so long, Rachel is proud of something she has accomplished. It makes her feel competent and capable. Able to find her footing in this new world. The song is perfect. It just needs a singer now. It just needs a voice.

It's been forever since she's reached out to him. It's after midnight. But she calls Kurt anyway - calls, not texts - and waits for him to pick up.

"Rachel? Are you okay?" he asks, sounding nothing if not concerned.

"I have a favor to ask," she begins, and prays he will listen.

_To be continued…_


	3. Chapter 3

One year later, Rachel finally sees what is in front of her.

Three weeks earlier, her first semester of college ended, and she packed a bag. She flew to New York City. This was the agreement she and Kurt had come to. He wouldn't just sing her song; he would sing it for his final performance recital. The catch was that he had been rehearsing his first solo idea for months. Changing his mind this late in the game would be risky. So, Rachel had to get her butt to New York as soon as possible so they could begin rehearsals. She had to be open to his ideas and possible corrections, and likewise, so did he. She arrived on the fourth - two and a half weeks before Kurt's final.

New York is everything Rachel has imagined it. It is hectic and bustling. People are irreverent and in a hurry. But they are also driven, in a way Rachel admires. They are also kind, in a way she strives to reciprocate. Rachel becomes adept at using her eyes and her body language to convey a message or get someone's attention. It's been a learned skill, much like her eventual solution to class participation. Raising her own hand, waiting to be called on, and then speaking the answer to a classmate nearby, who would repeat it at a more appropriate volume. Now that she is in New York, Kurt has made arrangements - Rachel has no idea how - for her to stay in his dorm. She suspects his father is behind it, but whatever the reason, Rachel is grateful not to be responsible for finding a large amount of money to cover hotel and cab fare.

Kurt is changed, but he is also refreshingly the same. He treats her the same as he always has. He isn't afraid to yell at her, to laugh with her, to tell her when she's wrong, or to ask her advice. It is everything she has hoped it would be. During the day, while Kurt is still in classes, she takes his practice room pass, and holes up in a tiny room, with a glorious grand piano. It's tuned and beautiful and Rachel spends countless hours there, playing through the newest version of her song. It has to be flawless.

For the first time in her life, she is not Rachel Berry the singer, but Rachel Berry the composer. She is Rachel Berry, the accompanist. And it feels good. It feels right.

In the evenings, she and Kurt rehearse. He angles his body toward her so he can see if she holds up a hand to stop him. Her fingers ache and her music is scarred with pencil marks. She knows Kurt's own looks much the same.

Before she knows it, it is Wednesday, May twenty-second. It's the evening of Kurt's final. Rachel is nervous. She's brought dresses, but none seems right. Neither of her dads have much fashion sense.

"What's wrong?" Kurt asks, rushing around. "By the way, can you text Blaine and my parents and tell them to please _stop _texting me? They're asking where they should eat and what they should wear, and I can't think about that right now!"

"Then, I suppose you don't want me admitting that I don't have a single thing suitable for being your NYADA solo composer and pianist…" Rachel ventures.

"Oh! Did I forget to mention?" Kurt asks with a grin. "I sent Chandler Kiehl on a little mission recently…with your measurements…and specific requests…"

"You gave him my measurements?" Rachel gasps, scandalized.

"Well, it has to fit!" Kurt shoots back, tossing her a garment bag.

"This is Chandler from the music store, who almost broke up you and Blaine?" Rachel asks, trailing off as she gets her first look at the dress. It's simple, modest and elegant, black, with very little fuss and frills. There is something else in the bottom of the bag and Rachel reaches for it. "A scarf?" she asks tentatively.

Kurt stops rushing around the room long enough to walk over to her. To take her hands. To look her in the eyes. "It's not because I'm ashamed. It's because I sent Chandler out the day after you called and I wasn't sure how comfortable you were with the scar. Feel free to wear it or not. You'll look fabulous either way," he says, kissing her cheek.

"It _is_ pretty fabulous," she ventures, winding it around her neck experimentally. It's multicolored and delicate - a great accent to all the black. "I guess I could always take it off."

"Exactly. Now, I love you, but I have to get ready. Why don't you rest that leg before you wear it out on the pedals tonight?" he jokes lightly.

"Do you still want the key change in the second chorus or not?" she asks, wedging herself into the bathroom behind him. She steps into the shower, fully clothed, and pulls the curtain. Soon, she tosses what she's wearing out in a pile. "Kurt?" she prompts, sticking just her head out and waiting for an answer.

"Yeah, let's keep it," he decides. "Can you take a really hot shower, so it gets really steamy in here? It'll be good for my voice," he says, and then stops short. Until he hears Rachel's broken laugh from behind the curtain.

"Anything I can do to help…" she promises good-naturedly, before realizing that Kurt probably can't hear her over the water. So she sticks her head out and repeats herself, an honest smile on her face.

* * *

Rachel is busy right up until Kurt's final performance of the evening. She dresses in her evening outfit; scarf included, and barely has enough time to fix hair and makeup before Kurt taps on the door. First, he reminds her of his request to intercept the bevy of text messages from Blaine asking about wardrobe choices and restaurants. Next, she handles the case of nerves Kurt develops when he can't hit the song's high note, with the key change.

"Don't worry about it. We'll work around it," Rachel reassures.

"_How _will we work around it, Rachel? This is my final! My final that I changed three weeks prior!"

She raises a hand. Silences him with a look. "Calm down."

Instead, he glances at the screen of his phone and groans. "Oh, my _God_! Can't my family drama wait twenty-four hours?!" Kurt glances at her. "Finn's not coming. He evidently told Carole he was flying in tonight but changed his mind at the last minute."

"He's probably pretty busy what with the army and everything…" Rachel ventures.

"He's not _in _the army! He's living in Cincinnati with his fiancée!" Kurt explodes before he realizes what he's said. "I'm so sorry. I never meant for you to find out like this."

"It's okay," Rachel reassures. And somehow, it is. She puts her arms around Kurt. "He deserves to be happy. So do you, though. He's your brother, and he should be here for you."

"Oh, I have to go!" Kurt exclaims. "Be ready to go on at 7:45."

"Good luck!" Rachel tells him and blows him a kiss, so she won't risk messing up his look for the evening.

* * *

It isn't until she's seated backstage, with a program from the ushers that she realizes Kurt's final isn't just based on singing. It's three parts. A dance final. An acting final. And a signing final. As Rachel skims the program she realizes that most of his classmates have found a way to integrate all three into one performance, while Kurt is doing all that, plus Rachel's song.

She's momentarily distracted by guilt when she remembers she has to practice. So she plays the piece against her knees, committing the fingering to memory again and again. Her phone buzzes in her purse and she almost ignores it, but the thought that it could be Kurt and what if he needs something has her checking anyway. It also could be her fathers, who have insisted on coming, even though Rachel told them they didn't have to cancel their annual cruise. They could be searching for parking outside, or wanting to tell her just how difficult NYADA's campus was to find. But she sees neither of these things.

What she does see is stunning. It's a picture from Blaine. The title says: _We're here! _Beneath that she sees Burt, Carole and Blaine - those faces she expects - but somehow, too - there is half of Quinn's face and what could only be one of Santana's eyes. She doesn't know how the girls got away from school and work, but she doesn't care. It means the world to her that they made the effort, even though she has not seen them in so long.

Rachel tries not to be nervous as she sits through impressive performances from NYADA freshman. She tries with all her being to be happy for them. She tries to focus on sending them the positive energy that she would want, if it were her up there. She tries to remember that she isn't here for herself, she's here for Kurt. The evening flies by and before she knows it, Kurt is performing a selection from _Sweeny Todd_. Rachel is glad he didn't tell her about this part. It is so gory and there is a lot of blood. It's this, and nothing else, that makes her turn away.

Then, it's 7:45 and Rachel stands. She waits in the wings until Kurt joins her, quick-changing out of his first ensemble and into his second. Then, they walk onstage. Rachel, to the piano, and Kurt to the microphone.

"Hello. I'm Kurt Hummel. Before I begin I just want to say that Madame Tibideaux has graciously allowed me to perform an extra number tonight, not for credit, just as a personal favor. This is a song, written and composed by my dear friend, Rachel Berry. This is _White Picket Fences_," he says and gestures slightly for Rachel to begin.

Her fingers find the notes effortlessly and muscle memory takes over. She has no sheet music. Rachel glances at Kurt to be sure the tempo is okay. She presses her lips together and tries not to cry as he starts to sing. They have the same range. The same heart. The same passion. Yet now, they are a different kind of team. Friends who don't compete against each other, but work together to help each other reach a goal.

She feels so much older than eighteen.

"You might believe that white picket fences are everything. You might believe they'd keep you safe and set you free. You might believe they're everything worth striving for. But tonight…just breathe…because white picket fences are haunting me," Kurt sings, his voice soaring. Rachel gets chills all along her arms. By now, they are not Kurt and Rachel, they are a single being, completely in sync with one another. She plays and he sings and they just know the other will be there.

"You might see every direction your life will take. You might need to hold onto the fantasy even when it's too late. You might hold tight, even as it slips away. That white picket fence…and all it represents…" Kurt sings with all the emotion Rachel could have hoped for.

"Because where I spun and where I stopped. Thrown to the universe. Don't look up. Am I still spinning? Am I still spinning? Am I still spinning? Can you stop me? Don't interrupt. Where I go next is up to me.

"You might believe you're not meant for more than this. You might believe, as I did, that you had bigger dreams. But watch your step along the way…those white picket fences are not what they say."

Kurt's voice embraces the chorus again, singing it just as Rachel would have. "Because where I spun and where I stopped. Thrown to the universe. Don't look up. Am I still spinning? Am I still spinning? Am I still spinning? Can you stop me? Don't interrupt. Where I go next is up to me." His voice breaks and she prays he keeps going.

"Maybe I missed the lesson. Maybe it's about protection. Maybe it's about being that safety, not fearing the fences…and all they represent…

"Because where I spun and where I stopped. Thrown to the universe. Don't look up. Am I still spinning? Am I still spinning? Am I still spinning? Can you stop me? Don't interrupt. Where I go next is up to me."

"Maybe I'll be the white picket fences…" Kurt finishes softly.

* * *

There is complete silence in the audience, and then a loud whoop that can only have come from Kurt's dad. The audience rose to its feet and applauded as Rachel her eyes with the back of her hand.

She doesn't expect it when she feels Kurt take her hand and lead her to center stage to take a bow. Instead, she presents him first, insists that he take the applause and the recognition because he's earned it.

Then, she takes a small bow of her own, feeling strangely shy and overwhelmed. This is new. This is different. This is personal. This was about helping Kurt, not herself. Rachel finds herself thinking about how far she has come in just a year's time. How far she might go in years to come.

As she seeks out her dads in the audience and feels their embraces, and those of Kurt's parents, everything sinks in. As Kurt, Blaine, Quinn and Santana surround her, Rachel feels oddly at peace with this new role. She can envision herself doing this. Enjoying being in the background and helping her friends rise to whatever heights they may.

Everyone is crying. No one speaks.

For once, it's not just her.

And through her tears, Rachel smiles.

_The End._


End file.
